Book Description

Using GIS to Assist Location and Site Selection concentrates on how real life problems and decisions of business location can be supported through the integration of modeling and mapping with GIS. It covers one of the most powerful tools currently utilized to assist the location and site decision selection of the best suitable alternative. Using GIS to Assist Location and Site Selection introduces the reader to the historic background of site selection analysis, extensively explains trade area and shows how to use available web-map applications to gather demographic data. A variety of cases are presented within this paper to explain how to use GIS in site location/selection. Each case unfolds and is associated to a modeling pattern. Chapter 3 covers line based analysis along a network by illustrating the use of GIS in the decision making process of a case study of sitting a path/corridor based on the amount of full-time employees along the path. Chapter 4 follows with an example of the approach of location based on characteristics of a specific area which involves the selection of multiple land parcels for acquisition. Chapter 5 concentrates on coverage based analysis that introduces multiple facilities and location-allocation model. In every case study, the preferred modeling tool was extracted from the toolbox of ESRI Desktop version 10 software. The author describes how to use GIS to capture, store, transform, analyze and display geographic data to make it available to decision makers. The paper concludes with a discussion on the lessons learned from each case study, highlights what tools are available to real estate developers for location analysis and what does the future holds in location analysis with GIS.